Shadow
by Last of the Lilac Wine
Summary: Alexandria Tsvetkov is an ex-S.H.I.E.L.D agent suffering from severe post traumatic stress disorder after a mission in Bulgaria turns sour. A year on, S.H.I.E.L.D have re-appeared in her life again with a new job offer: to aid in the rehabilitation process of The Winter Soldier. But with Nick Fury, no motive can really be what it seems...DISCONTINUED
1. Chapter 1

**SHADOW**

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**A/N **A few quick important things about this story. It's based after the events of _Captain America: The Winter Soldier _with a few distinctions: S.H.I.E.L.D was not dissolved and Nick Fury commissioned the Winter Soldier to be taken in on a rehabilitation project.

Chapter **Rated T **for several accounts of swearing.

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**CHAPTER 1**

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I have another bad, restless night so my workout starts early again, just as dawn breaks.

There's a fine vapor of morning mist in the air that turns my face dewy and sticks my fringe to my forehead; the sunrise is diluted into a haze in front of me through low cloud. The only sound is the regular inand outpant of my breath and my sneakers crunching against gravel as I run.

It's nice. The rest of Washington D.C is still sleeping. There's the occasional blare of a car horn from the depths of the city as delivery vans start their rounds, but here, by the river, even the birds are still sleeping.

I reach the Boat House and do some stretches on the river bank. I try to really _feel _the sensation of my muscles relaxing like my therapist told me to, so I can practice replicating it in situations I find stressful. Exercise is now my main prescribed medication; strictly non-confrontational activities though, obviously.

After the third cycle of stretches I feel the near-constant knot of tenseness in my lower back finally start to unravel and fish the keys to the boat shed out of my rucksack along with my headphones and iPod. This is a cheat; all music is strictly supposed to be calming and uplifting but I'm competitive by nature and that kind of stuff doesn't quite cut it for me. As I kicked off the dock in my little one-man rowing boat I stuffed the headphones into my ears, letting the familiar crashing rhythm wash over me. The world successfully blocked out I dip my oars into the water and pull, each stroke becoming more powerful than the last as I fall into a familiar rhythm. Over the loud music I can barely hear the splash of the water; my swift little boat darts along and it feels like I'm gliding over the river.

By the time I reach my half way point – the bridge which arches over the widest point of the river to transport the main traffic into the city – the sun is almost fully up and there are other joggers running along the adjacent paths. I turn round and head back for the boat house; so focused on my rowing that I never notice the figure on the bridge, coat flapping ominously round their knees.

Its past 8 AM by the time I've replaced my lean little boat onto its rack amongst all the other boats and locked up. The music's still going, my body pulsing with the relentless crashing beat as I bend over to ease the stitch in my side.

I sense his presence before he makes himself known and straighten, wrenching the headphones out of my ears in irritation and stuffing them into my rucksack on the ground before straightening up and slinging it aggressively over my shoulder.

"Do you know what _forced retirement _means," I snap, stalking down the path towards home with out checking to see if they were following. "It means we have a mutual agreement never to see each other again."

"Your retirement was conditional."

"_On_?!"

"You're mental health. It was stipulated on the forms –"

I whirl round, wrenching the hood of my jumper down, my hair practically bristling with anger. "You dropped me for PTSD you _cold. Heartless. Bastard_."

"You're redundancy package was quite substantial if I recall correctly," replied Nick Fury, rolling his eyes. Or eye. I confess I was surprised to see him patch-free, his right eye starting unseeingly into me, the kind of milky opaque colour that makes kids scared.

"_If you recall correctly_," I echoed, sneeringly. I turn round and carry on walking, shaking my head. "You have the compassion of a sledgehammer to the face, Nick."

"It wasn't a decision taken lightly to drop you, Alex. You were one of our greatest out on the field."

"Oh, you lost one of your top, but perfectly dispensable spies, did you? Let me play you the world's _tiniest fucking violin_. Do you have any idea how it felt for me to lose my job? That was my _life._"

"Good. Then you should be jumping at the chance to have it back, then."

I turn round and punch him in the face. Hard.

"Don't you dare try to contact me again. Don't even think about coming _near _me," I spat. "We are done, Nick. You made that quite clear over a year ago. My time at S.H.I.E.L.D is _through_."

He didn't say anything, just held a hand to one side of his face, working his jaw silently.

I turned and walked away. This time he didn't try to follow me.

* * *

Dr Angelina Quick has probably dealt with hundreds of other ex-field S.H.I.E.L.D agents like me over the years. You can tell because she seems to have a way of dealing with us down to a fucking science and nothing ever seems to phase her. She's always unflappably patient and calm – and believe me, I've tried to break that cool exterior many times.

As I sit, wound up like a ticking time bomb across from her, she voices the question that I've been asking myself every time I come to one of our sessions.

"Why do you still come to these meetings, Miss Tsvetkov?" she asks, leaning back in her chair and steepling her fingers on top of my file. So far she hasn't written in it. Yet. "I've had many patients of your sort of temperament over the years who just…disappear. Use their acquired skills to hide somewhere even S.H.I.E.L.D can't find them. Live out the rest of their lives under a new aliases. Quieter lives. Better lives, maybe."

"Believe me, I've been tempted," I snap, snidely.

Dr Quick leans forwards over her desk, the S.H.I.E.L.D pin on the front of her white coat briefly catching the harshly bright overhead lighting. "And yet, here you are," she says, opening her hands slightly. "Still here. Even after all this time."

I feel my hands ball into fists. Still here. Like a good doggy. Like an unshakeable _shadow._ The thought triggers my hands to curl up a little tighter, my nails biting into my skin. "Yeah. After all this time. You know why? Because I'm _still_ having panic attacks. Because I _still_ can't sleep at night. Because whenever I think about Bulgaria I get this feeling in my head like it's going to god damn explode." I suddenly can't see, like there's suddenly some kind of red mist over my eyes. I'm aware that I'm stood up. That my chair's toppled over behind me and that I'm yelling. "_One year! _You were fucking supposed to make it all stop! That was the deal! That's what you promised me!"

"Is that true?" she asks, so calm that I want to throttle her. Voice so steady that I want to throw something.

"Is what true?" I snarl.

"You've been having panic attacks?"

"Cut the bullshit, I know you've been watching me. I know my apartment's bugged. I see the guys tailing me in their little black SUVs 'incognito'."

"Why didn't you take up Fury's offer to take you back?"

I laugh in her face. "I thought therapists were supposed to have the patient's best interests at heart. Not their bosses."

"I was merely asking how the situation made you feel; why you didn't accept his offer. Do you know why he wants you back?"

"Well I didn't wait round for a fucking job description if that's what you mean. And whilst you're feeding all this back to Fury after our little 'therapy session' you can tell him that there is no way I'm going back out onto the field. Ever."

Dr Quick surveys me closely for a several seconds, her brow furrowed. "Alex what if I told you – truthfully – that Fury had no intention of re-hiring you as a spy."

"I'm not taking a desk-job," I said flatly, folding my arms. "So he can go to hell."

Something in her eyes flickers and I'm perversely glad that my stubbornness is finally starting to irritate her. "No, that's not it, either." She reaches for my folder and slips out a chunky file, pushing it across the table towards me. "Of course," she says, "you'll be aware of the recent events of HYDRA's infiltration of S.H.I.E.L.D., it was all over the news a few days ago and you –"

"Obviously kept a few tabs on S.H.I.E.L.D, yeah," I say, absentmindedly, picking up the folder and rifling through it.

"-well Fury wanted to assign you to a rehabilitation project. The Winter Soldier - or, rather, James Buchanan Barnes."

I looked down at the tortured image of a young man lying in a hospital bed, all manners of wires and electrodes taped to his head. It was the final date in a long report – the picture taken only yesterday. I swallowed, my hands suddenly shaking slightly. "Why…why me?"

"Take the file home for the night. Read it. Sleep on the idea," said Quick, suddenly busying herself with tidying her desk. "If you decide yes…well, you know where to find us."

I role my eyes. Of course they weren't going to tell me their true motives yet.

Still, I looked back down at the file, something nagging at the back of my head. I turned and righted my chair silently, sliding the file carefully into my rucksack. Fully aware that Dr Quick's eyes never left me as I slipped out the room.

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**A/N **So there's the first chapter! Please **review **if you're interested and would like more. Of course, constructive criticism is always welcome.

_Last Of The Lilac Wine. _


	2. Chapter 2

**SHADOW **

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**A/N **I am absolutely overwhelmed by the support this fic received on its first chapter – I really didn't expect so many people to read it and I'm flattered that you all enjoyed it so much.

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**CHAPTER 2**

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I reverse out of the parking lot like the smallest bump could possibly cause the whole car to shatter like glass and then pull out onto the main road. I'm driving carefully – not because I'm nervous or upset, but because I feel antsy as hell. Maybe it's the shitty weather. It's already 11 AM and the morning's mist still hasn't cleared giving me a perverse sense of latent claustrophobia. I switch on my windscreen wipers as the fog clings to the shell of my car in a fine drizzle.

My eyes keep on flicking to the rucksack lying on the passenger seat, as if I have X-ray vision that might allow me to see the report inside. It makes no sense that Nick Fury hunted me down to sign _me _up for this and the fact that I can't figure out why is driving me insane. It can't be so that the Winter Soldier can have an equally unbalanced kindred spirit to be chummy with otherwise Fury would have just roped in Captain America. My hands reflexively grip the steering a little tighter. Is that reason staring me in the face? Have I just gone blind after months out of the field; run stale?

Ah, worry, worry, worry.

My foot has a reflexive twitch that has me repeatedly hitting the gas accidentally, causing the entire car to lurch forwards and trigger a chorus of angry car horns. I used to be a good driver. Look at me now. My license should probably be revoked. I make it to my destination in one piece though – driving with exaggerated care through the traffic-jammed streets of Washington.

I follow another car into the multi-story parking complex. It has a bumper sticker that reads '_kick my iron ass' _with a picture of Iron Man alongside it. You can guarantee that practically every third or fourth car in America has some kind of Avengers-related bumper sticker after New York last year.

I pull into a free space and kick the car door open. The parking lot is dingy – cement pillars snaked with graffiti – and I look round warily before locking up. I keep feeling like I'm being watched, but that's probably just residue paranoia from the knowledge of what HYDRA almost achieved. Sacrificing freedom to achieve complete security.

Still, I pull up my hood to shield my face and make note of the probably harmless guy sitting eating a sandwich in a van marked _Kenny's Florists_.

My eyes narrow. Isn't it a bit early for a lunch break? Isn't this a strange place for a florist's delivery van to be parked?

I keep my gaze on my feet as I stalk past, peering at the man out of the corner of my eye.

He continues to stuff his face with the stupid sandwich.

* * *

My apartment greets me with cool indifference as I let myself in. I ignore the well-chosen décor; the sharp, clean edges and muted tones as I dump my stuff down on the sofa. My apartment is stylish – well thought out – but it is not a home. S.H.I.E.L.D placed me in this residence when I first started working for them six years ago and over the course of those six years I was barely in it longer than one – maybe two, months. One whole year came as a bit of a shock to the system.

The only thing that looks vaguely homey is the sunflowers in the vase on the breakfast table. These aren't mine, obviously. My mother must have let herself in earlier this morning whilst I was out; there's a vague smell of Chanel perfume in the air that tells me I'm right, and when I check the fridge to verify there's fresh milk and homemade vegetable lasagna balanced precariously atop my stack of ready-meals. I take the lasagna out and heat it up in the microwave for lunch.

I've just raised the first forkful to my mouth when my whole body freezes. It's started to rain heavily outside now, the kind of rain that comes down so badly it sounds like the showers running. I stare out the window blankly for a second; trying to process what my body's telling me before I restlessly set my plate back down on the kitchen work top

I remove the flowers from the table and set the vase down on the floor carefully before dragging the table to the center of the room and clambering on top of it. I test the airduct grille in the ceiling, pushing up against it, but it doesn't budge. When I run my hands over the edges I can't feel any screws and my face tightens. I jump down from the table and head to my bedroom, grabbing the toolbox from the back of my wardrobe. I dismiss the standard screwdriver and spanner in the top compartment that I use as a poor attempt to cover the S.H.I.E.L.D classified gadgets kept underneath. I put what look like screws in my mouth one by one, holding them carefully in my lips and grab a high-tech looking drill and then clamber back up onto the table.

I ram the screws in tight at each corner of the vent and then press a button on the handle of the drill. There's a small bang, and the airduct grille drops with a clatter, denting the wood below. I stand on my toes and look up into the vent.

There – right there in the top corner, so miniscule you'd barely see it – is the chip. I rip it off its aluminum bed with my nail and then crush it between my thumb and forefinger. Almost instantly my mobile phone starts to ring from somewhere in the apartment; a shrill, insistent siren.

I kick the grille across the room, and then let myself drop from the table again with a heavy thud.

I do a complete sweep of my apartment swiftly and adeptly. My phone stops ringing after three minutes, but I can't bring myself to care. I find a similar chip in the bathroom, in the toilet cistern and again in my bedroom, behind the headboard of the bed.

I'm not surprised when I walk back into the living room that Nick Fury and Maria Hill now occupy my apartment like they own it. When I enter Nick looks up at me from the breakfast table and shows me another small, electronic chip in his hand like an offering.

"You forgot the one in the fridge," he says, crushing it between his palm and the wooden surface of the table.

"Right, because I totally forgot that you need to bug my grocery's conversations?!"

"We like to be thorough," called Maria from the living room calmly.

I bit the inside of my cheek hard enough to taste blood. "I thought I made it perfectly clear this morning that I never wanted to see you again." I said, my voice straining to stay level.

"We received a distress call coming from your apartment."

"_A distress call_," I sneered.

"Well," Fury amended, "distressing for us."

"Do not bug my apartment again."

He ignored me, reaching out to touch my mother's bouquet of flowers and I stalked forwards, snatching the vase out of his reach. "Leave. _Now_." I snapped.

"I know you don't trust us –"

"No, Nick. I didn't trust you even when I worked for you. You approach to S.H.I.E.L.D agents has always been like mushrooms, am I right? Feed them utter _shit _and keep them in the dark. But bugging my apartment when I don't even work for you anymore? Can you understand why that screws with my head?" I ranted, gesturing wildly at my temples. "I can't walk down a freaking road with out looking over my shoulder anymore. I'm going to a therapist every week to get better but I _can't _get better because you are _always there. _Because you are _always watching_."

His expression is unreadable. "If you read that file and take up the project, you have my word we'll stop following you."

"Or. _Or_. There's an option here why I have the freedom of choice to _not _take up your god damn project and you have the human decency to stop following me." I turn my back on him, slamming down the vase down on the kitchen counter before whirling back round, raising an eyebrow.

"All our ex-agents are wild-cards, Alex" Fury said, spreading his hands. "Loose canons. There's always the potential another organization could pick them up and make use of them. We can never allow one of our employees out of our surveillance. Even after they've left S.H.I.E.L.D."

I shook my head, crossing my arms. "I don't trust that this is _just_ a rehabilitation program. I'm sorry; I just don't trust you anymore. I'm not going to do it."

Nick sighed, straightening up from his seat. As if this was her cue, Maria walked to my apartment door, holding it open for him expectantly.

Before leaving he scooped up the file from where it lay on my sofa and placed it in my hands. Two eyes bored into mine; one keenly sharp, the other unseeing. "Maybe you should ask yourself, who _do _you trust anymore, Alex. This could be exactly what you need."

My hands started shaking again. An annoying symptom of PTSD. Somehow I doubted Fury had my personal wellbeing in mind.

The door closed behind the two of them and I stood utterly still, listening to the rain hammering against the window pane and feeling my heart rate start to rapidly increase; my breathing rate become sharper and shorter. My eyes caught the crushed remains of the electronic bug on the table and I suddenly grab the vase, hurling it as hard as I can at the closed door.

* * *

**A/N **I know, Alex still has yet to meet Bucky. I promise it will happen soon, but she's not about to jump into this when there are so many obvious trust issues on both sides. Hopefully it'll make their first interaction all the more sweeter – or, more interesting, I should probably say.

Thanks for reading!

Please **review**!

Last Of The Lilac Wine


	3. Chapter 3

**SHADOW **

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**CHAPTER 3**

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Breathing heavily, I unsteadily lowered myself down until I was crouched back on my heels. Like Alice in Wonderland: suddenly too big in what seemed like too smaller space. I sat there like that for a while; past caring when the joints in my knees began to flare with pain – straightening up only when my heart had stilled and the sugared rush of adrenaline had filtered back out of my blood.

I swept broken glass into the trash and then leant back against the kitchen work top with the Winter Soldier report in my hands.

It was in a class of its own – the file itself; scientifically precise in a way that made me unsettlingly feel like this was a slow dissection of the man's life – citing sources, interviews – tax records that dated back to the freaking 1930s and 40s. I didn't need to check to know that this was Maria Hill's work. I finished the report in a little over 2 hours and then flipped back to the front and re-read it all over again. Despite myself, I kept returning to the picture of Barnes taken only 2 days ago. Lying in a hospital bed, he looked like he'd just been dragged in for emergency surgery after getting caught up in some kind of bombing. The camera's high resolution was unkind – I could see every minute detail down to the exhausted red rings round his eyes as he slept. His bionic arm was missing; the right shoulder ending in a badly cauterized stump on the white sheets. _Undergoing cognitive recalibration therapy_, the caption read. An earlier picture had shown several thousand wires taped to his temples.

I looked at that picture for a long time; my face outwardly dispassionate. Inside, my mind was tearing itself to shreds.

* * *

Nurse Tessa Rodrigez swiped her security pass and then bent her head a little to gaze into the retinal scanning camera. There was a flash of green as her left eye was registered and then a low hiss as the automatic doors to S.H.I.E.L.D's high-security ward glided open.

She blinked at the harsh glare of the prosthetic lighting in the long corridor. Rodrigez had worked in S.H.I.E.L.D's medical bay for almost fifteen years now and should have been used to the harshly bright lighting. I, on the other hand, was not, but only a slight tightening round my eyes showed that. My fingers scratched at the back of my neck in what I hoped was a casual gesture as I brushed my fingers experimentally over the space underneath my ear where a tiny microchip sat on my skin. Effectively, it allowed me to wear a hologram of Tessa Rodrigez's face whilst she was being diverted from her journey to work by a fake call from a neighbor saying anxiously that they could see smoke coming out from underneath her front door – and that they'd phone the 911 – but could she please come quickly; they thought something might be on fire.

I pulled on the sleeves of the nurse's uniform I'd picked up from a locker in the changing rooms; Tessa Rodrigez's skin was definitely more tanned than mine. Fortunately, there was no-one present on the ward corridor that would look too closely.

The Winter Soldier's door required another retinal scan and a security clearance code, which I didn't know. Damn.

I faltered, wondering what to do. My mask had a lifespan of approximately thirty minutes; fifteen of which I'd already spent working my way through a maze of corridors to get down here. I looked up and down the hall. Empty; but there were three security camera's pointing in my direction. I could feel the cool pressure of my 22 mm against my lower back, but shooting the cameras and then shooting the lock free wasn't an option. The moment a security camera went offline in S.H.I.E.L.D I knew for a fact an alert immediately went to the head of security – even if it happened to be just a technical error. If I got caught breaking into _this _room without authorization, I knew it was going to look pretty bad. Fury was already paranoid about turncloak ex-agents; I didn't need to add fuel to the flames.

The door suddenly jerked open, and a doctor stepped out. He looked at me, obviously surprised, but not suspicious.

"Rounds already?" he asked, and I just shrugged. I was wearing a mask, not a voice recalibration system. Without anything to go on what Tessa Rodrigez sounded like, I doubted I could make a convincing imitation.

"Okay. Well. He's pretty stable in there at the moment. Asleep." He handed me a clipboard with some charts on that I pretended to busy myself with flipping through so I wouldn't have to reply. "He needs a 2.5 mg dosage of midazolam. Otherwise, he's recovering well."

"Midazolam?" I said, forgetting myself and looking up sharply. "But that's a sedative."

"We've had some issues after the first round of ECT. Aggression. Short term memory loss. He has no idea where he is. If there's any problems, security's down the hall."

"Okay. Thanks."

I waited until the doctor had cleared the first set of automatic doors down the corridor before slipping inside. I had time to register that the room's lighting had been dimmed; contrasting to such an extent that the white glare in the hallway that for a second I couldn't see. My other four senses kicked in though, and before even I had time to realize what I was doing I was ripping my handgun out from the elastic waist band of my scrubs and aiming it at the shadows in the corner immediately to my left.

"They said you were asleep," I snapped out. My hands were shaking again; a barely noticeable tremor, but still – this kind of thing didn't happen a year ago.

"And you're not a nurse," a voice rasped out from the darkness. "What are you doing here?"

"Becoming supremely disappointed with the state of security in this place." I paused, and then gestured with my gun. "Step out into the light where I can see you."

He didn't immediately, and for a while all I could hear was my own breathing as my eyes adjusted to the dim light. When he did, however, I blinked, lowering my gun reflexively: he looked like hell. Worse than even the picture in the file. Then I noticed that his bionic arm had been refitted and my arms locked straight out in front of me again.

"Do you work for HYDRA?" he asked.

"No."

"I don't believe you."

"Well, I guess you're entitled to your opinions." I reached up to my throat with one hand, keeping the gun trained on his forehead with the other, and picked the microchip off of my skin. There was a flicker in front of my eyes as the hologram of Tessa Rodrigez's face disappeared. "My name is Alex Tsvetkov. I don't work for HYDRA - or S.H.I.E.L.D."

"What do you want with me?"

I shrugged. "Morbid interest, I guess."

Shadows slipped across his face as he took a step to his right, like a panther stalking its prey. The movement was calculated, calm. I didn't expect him to snap. To be so fast – or so strong.

The robotic hand suddenly crushed round my throat as he surged forwards, tight as a tourniquet, and my back slammed into the wall.

"_STOP LYING TO ME_!" he yelled in my face in Russian. Like a fire raging out of control; a house collapsing in on itself. His metal hand squeezed a little tighter round my throat; cold like I'd always imagined death would feel like. His other hand ripped my gun out of my hand and he pressed it against my temple. "_How did you get past HYDRA guards_?"

"You're in a lot of pain," I said as levelly as I could through my severely constricted airway. "It makes it hard to think. But listen to me: you are not in Russia anymore. You're in America: this is a S.H.I.E.L.D hospital-"

"I don't know how the hell you got in here, but enemies of HYDRA go straight to the top of my kill list."

"You're not listening," I choked out. My oxygen for speech was rapidly disappearing. My own gun was digging into my temple painfully. There was a feeling in my stomach like it was about to explode. Stay calm.

You have to stay calm.

"You're not listening," I repeated again. "You need to pay attention. You need to focus. What's the last thing you remember?" My hands were scrabbling against the wall – my nails scratching at the pain feebly. It took all my will power to hold his gaze as solidly as I could. "What's your last memory?"

His hand loosened and I used the chance to slither out of his grip quickly, dropping to the floor and rolling into a crouch behind him, my chest heaving.

"This – this –" His hands flew to his head, and his face screwed up into one of agony. "I remember _him_."

"What's his name?"

"I don't know – I don't know – _I don't_ –"

I cut him off, seeing that the anger was in danger of taking over again. "Fine. How would you describe him?"

"He's tall - he didn't used to be, but he is now." His shoulders were tense. He was pacing the room like a caged animal.

I closed my eyes, focusing on inhaling and exhaling, even though it hurt like hell to just even breathe. "It's okay. You're remembering Steve Rogers. Your childhood friend."

"I'm…I'm punching him."

"That's nice." Inhale, exhale. I felt light headed. I lifted my head to glance at my escape route – the door - and then almost laughed out loud. Retinal scan. Security code. Of course it would be locked from the inside as well. I looked at the microchip lying broken on the ground. Hilarious…

"I'm about to kill him."

"You didn't."

He turned to look at me, his expression conflicted. "How can you know that?" he said, roughly.

"Because him and S.H.I.E.L.D are all over the news at the moment. There's been a…massive security leak…you really need to get out more _Bucky_."

And, stupid, half-delirious me, that was the trigger word.

He rushed for me again and I scrambled, reaching for the red security alert button on the wall above my head.

I just had time to punch it before he fisted a hand in my hair and threw me back against the wall across the room.

* * *

**A/N **A reviewer asked if Steve and Natasha are going to appear in this, and the answer is that they most definitely will! Thank you for all your kind reviews – they're really appreciated and they definitely keep me motivated when writing.

Last Of The Lilac Wine


	4. Chapter 4

**SHADOW**

* * *

**CHAPTER 4**

* * *

By the time security reach us, we literally have our hands round each other's throats as I try in vain to shove him off me.

Natasha Romanov - AKA the Black Widow - visits me in A&E, where - ironically - Nurse Tessa Rodrigez is patching me up. Ha.

Technically I'm not supposed to know her identity, and vice versa; as a general rule S.H.I.E.L.D agents usually don't, but it's impossible not to recognise her thanks to all the Avengers publicity.

"So what's the verdict?" she asks, folding her arms and settling herself into a seat at my bedside; talking with a familiarity reserved for an old friend instead of a new acquaintance.

"Two crack ribs, a sprained wrist, bruising to the throat and one hell of a black eye."

"You could have ditched the theatrics and requested a meeting."

I grunt. "I'm a bit of a Lone Ranger nowadays."

"You're also incredibly stupid. If security had arrived a minute later you would have been dead."

"But I'm not," I pointed out; then wince as the nurse dabs some kind of cream onto my already puffy eye. She doesn't relent - considering I stole her identity I probably deserve it. I look at my visitor out of the corner of my good eye. She's dressed in civilian clothing, but S.H.I.E.L.D agents have a certain obvious way of carrying themselves. "Did Fury send you?"

Her mouth twists in a half-smirk. "I'm a bit of a Lone-Ranger nowadays," she echoes, then elaborates: "I came here when the S.H.I.E.L.D security systems were alerted by a Code Red."

"That major, huh."

"The Winter Soldier is S.H.I.E.L.D's primary asset. Trust me when I say that any and all security intel is focused on him. A breach is most definitely a Code Red."

"Then it's pretty shocking intel if I can get past it with a stolen ID and a hologram mask," I remark flippantly. There's a disconcerting amount of blood spattered down the front of my nurse's uniform and I'm glad there's not a mirror in here. I really don't want to see the state I'm in.

"Don't be modest, from what I've heard about you it's not a surprise you got as far as you did - by the way, you've got a nosebleed."

I grumble, testing underneath my nose with the back of my hand - sure enough it comes back wet with blood. She rips out some tissues from the tissue box on the little table between us and hands me a wad. I tear them into smaller pieces and then stick some up my left nostril like a cork. _Urghh. _"I'm sensing an _exponential _'but' here," I say._  
_

She smiles, settling back into her chair. " - You can't seriously think you made it to Barnes with out S.H.I.E.L.D letting you."

"How did they know it was me?" I asked; pride stung.

"Tessa Rodrigez wasn't due to start her rounds for another seven minutes - for future reference she also has a slight Mexican accent and is known to be flirtatious with the Doctor's. You should know your marks better before you impersonate them. You also managed to shake your first tail on the way here, but we picked you up again around Haddon Avenue. Do you want me to go on?"

"I think I'm good," I shot back, sulkily.

"There's no shame in saying you aren't what you used to be. You'll pick it up again with time."

My eyes narrowed. "Fury _did _send you."

"No."

"So why are you here?"

"I was interested in if you _were_ HYDRA or the Red Room. The people in de-briefing are morons; I thought I'd make my own assessment on that particular issue."

"And?"

"Well, you're obviously not, considering how little thought you put into the whole scheme. Recklessness isn't the mark of a master assassin."

My eyebrows furrow. "You're really afraid that people are going to try to kill him?"

"Wary is the word I'd use. Everybody has enemies in our line of work, Agent Tsvektov."

I looked away. "_Your _line of work. Not mine. Not anymore."

She shrugs and stands, pushing her hands into the pockets of her hoody. "Suit yourself," she throws over her shoulder as she leaves the ward. "I'm sure I'll be seeing you around."

After she was gone I settled back into my funchy pillows and stared up at the ceiling, trying to determine which part of my body hurt the most. My eyes flutter shut for a second but then snap back open again when the nurse re-enters. I instantly zero in on the pole carrying the IV bag and the wheely table with a bottle and needle lying on.

"You really don't need to do that," I say, my voice stretched tight and brittle as glass.

She ignores me, approaching me with the needle. "It's just some pain killers mixed with a sedative. It's going to help you sleep."

"I said _no_," I snapped, grabbing her wrist tightly. "I'll be fine with out it."

"You need to sleep, otherwise you're not going to heal properly." Strong hands suddenly grab my arms, pinning me to my bed, and I realise she's been distracting me from the doctor who's quietly approached from my other side. "This is for your own good," he promises.

"_Get **off **of me!_" I screamed, as the nurse fluidly places the IV. I feel the needle break the skin in the crook of my left arm; watch as another nurse deposits the sedative into the IV bag - everyone moving with the efficiency of clockwork. "_No. Stop it! Stop -" _The slightly opaque drug mixes in with the salts and water and minerals in the IV. I watch as it slips down the crazy-straw tube towards me; feel the sickening coolness of it in my veins. "No..." I slurred, my vision beginning to blur as it quickly takes effect. "I said..._no..._"_  
_

* * *

I woke in the ward with sheeting drawn between me and the beds on my left and right. It's dark, and I guess that it's some time in the middle of the night. Through the curtains I can see a shadowshow of nurses moving from bed to bed, dim lights softly illuminating either end of the room.

My head feels fuzzy, and the back of my throat has a texture like sandpaper but at least I haven't had a nightmare, which usually plague me most nights.

I lie there, looking up at the ceiling. There's something naked and alien about the cool whiteness of everything. I catch the green glow of the alarm clock on my bedside table in my periphery and twist my head to look at the time.

- Except my head won't move. I try again, but the same thing happens. My eyes are still staring up at the ceiling, widening now as panic begins to creep up my spine. Experimentally, I try to twitch my fingers, but my body's a dead weight and won't obey me. I open my mouth to yell out but no sound comes out. I suck in air to muster a scream but I can't breathe in.

I can't breathe out.

There's no air in my lungs, and my rib cage wouldn't move to inhale or exhale oxygen anyway. I'm suffocating and I can't do anything about it.

Panic breaks free of it's shackles at the back of my mind, running rampant. All I can feel moving is my heart, beating faster and harder inside me like a caged bird trying desperately to escape; fluttering as it's slowly constricted because my arteries won't provide it with what it needs to survive.

There's a pressure on my chest now, pushing down with more and more force, and I can't reach with my arms to push it away. I can't tell if I'm going to be crushed to death first or suffocated.

_Wake me up! _I scream in my head. _Somebody wake me up - _

_- _Surely my ribs will break soon? Everything's pushing down on top of me - my bones are going to break - agonisingly - one by one -

I writhe in the constraints of my mind desperately. Hot tears leek from the corners of my eyes down the taut skin of my cheeks.

* * *

When I wake up my pillow's damp beneath me from where I've been crying in my sleep.

I snap up in two abruptly, sitting upright in bed and rip the damn IV out of my arm with a shaking hand. It's dark, and I press the palms of my hands into my eyes until I get my heart and breathing rate under control.

_I told them. I told them not to give me a sedative. _

This - _this _- was why I didn't sleep.

I lift up my top experimentally and wince. My ribs hurt worse than ever and pain lances through them as my chest heaves with panicked breathes. I drop the top back down to cover my abdomen.

Sheets are drawn round my bed, and I swing my feet onto the floor and tear them back to reveal the rest of the ward. Lights illuminate either end, like in my dream, but there are no nurses - only sleeping patients. I get up and walk to one of the doors with a fire exit sign glowing a ghostly green over it. Anything but sleep in the dark.

When I shove it open, a security guard instantly gets into my face.

"You're not supposed to be out here," he grinds out. "Go back to bed."

I walk past him.

"_Hey!" _he yells, following me down the corridor, but restrains himself from fully grabbing me. I guess that I look like I might break if anyone touches me.

"What were your orders, Agent?" I ask him, curtly.

"To keep an eye on you," he snaps back. "So _get back to bed_."

"No. You can 'keep an eye on me' whilst you escort me to where the Winter Soldier's being held."

He looks at me incredulously. "It's the middle of the night."

"Oh, and phone Nick Fury for authorisation - I don't want a repeat of earlier this evening," I continue, ignoring him - then turn and face him as he falters in the middle of the corridor, unsure. I place my hands on my hips, raising an eyebrow. "So are you going to ring Fury or what? 'Cause you look dumber than hell just standing there."

* * *

**A/N **So Alex has met Natasha - yay! Don't worry, Steve and Natasha will play large roles in this, I just haven't fully introduced them yet.

Also, Alex's dream gives a slight hint as to what caused her to be pulled out of the field, but I'd be very surprised if any of you could guess what the circumstances were.

Please **review**!

_Last Of The Lilac Wine_


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N **A few reviewers have mentioned grammatical/editing errors that crop up from chapter to chapter. For these, I apologize; I'll be going back through this fic to clear up any discrepancies tomorrow – meanwhile, I hope you all enjoy this chapter.

* * *

**SHADOW**

* * *

**CHAPTER 5**

* * *

Security clearance takes a little while to go through, but when it does, I'm ushered to a different private hospital room with a glass, one-way window. From outside, the room is crystal clear. From inside looking out, all you see is smoked tinted glass.

He really is asleep this time when I enter, the Winter Soldier. A quiet bleep marks his heart beat from a monitor like a distant wind and I settle myself as gently as I can into the metal chair by his bed. Injuries twinge all over my body as I settle down, and I grit my teeth against a pained hiss that threatens to escape out into the in silence.

I prop my elbows on my knees and steeple my hands in front of my face, letting my head sag ever so slightly. I'm tired to my bones, but there's no way I'm falling asleep again. Every nerve in my body is stretched as taut as piano wires; I couldn't sleep even if I wanted to.

I sit quietly for a very long time. Now that I'm here, I have no idea why I've come. Maybe it's to bask in the presence of someone who's been given the gift of forgetting everything, when that's the one thing I can't do.

I'm so tired and delirious from fatigue – when was the last time I ate? That mouthful of lasagna at lunch? – that I don't notice the hitch in the monitor's steady bleeping. Suddenly, when my gaze falls back onto him, his eyes snap open; _The Exorcist, _Round 2.

I tense instantly. His eyes are devastatingly lucid, like he's been watching me from a long time.

"Who…who are you?" he asks, his voice gravelly with sleep.

I watch him visibly take in the nurse's uniform stained with blood and gore; the bruises and bandages. I realize how bizarre this must look. To him. To me. "What happened to you?"

The corner of my mouth lifts slightly. "This is nothing. You should see the other guy."

I wish. There's barely a mark on him except for the raked claw lines my nails have left down the side of his face. I watch him touch them and realize I'm fooling nobody.

He swallows heavily and looks up at the ceiling. "I did that to you, didn't I?"

I don't answer. Call it self preservation, but I don't want to upset him. The monitor records a slight increase in heart rate. "I know you're just trying to help me," he continues, roughly, a muscle in his jaw jumping. "The ECT…it…it reminds me of what they did to me."

What they did to him was kryogenisis. It was mentioned several times on his file; HYDRA's eraser – an excruciatingly painful way of deleting all memories and keeping you alive for an infinite amount of time.

"You almost killed me," I say, before I can stop myself.

He stares up at the ceiling. His hair's fallen into his eyes; a curtain of personal privacy, so that I can't see his expression. "I'm not going to hurt you," he says finally, when he senses me tensing – sure that he's going to snap again.

It takes him to say it for me to fully realize that he won't. This is really _him _that I'm talking to. A person. Not an assassinating robot. I force myself to relax. "You don't need to say that."

"I do. I'm not going to hurt you."

I re-evaluate the situation. Who's he trying to convince? Himself or me?

I decide not to reply. My sprained wrist itches in its cast. He thinks I'm a nurse here, but what point is there in correcting him? He'll just forget this all the moment he closes his eyes again.

Sleep pulls him away from the here and now. I watch as his eyes begin to close, imagining I can see the gears whirring in his brain grind to a halt, shudder, and then begin to slowly click backwards. Memories resetting themselves. Forgetting this. Forgetting me.

A blank slate.

I slouch down further until I can rest my head against the back of the chair. I allow my eyes to flutter shut for a second – but only for a second.

_A blank slate_.

Jesus, if only.

* * *

Natasha Romanov moves to stand by Nick Fury as he gazes through the mirrored glass. He doesn't look at her as she approaches, but she knows he can see her coming in the reflection.

"Should've known you'd be around here snooping," he says.

"Should have known _you'd _be here snooping," she returns, suppressing a yawn. Through the one-way window she watches Alexandria Tsvetkov move in her seat – wince slightly at some hidden pain – and then settle again, waiting for the Winter Soldier to wake. Natasha frowns. It is incompressible that some compulsion seized her in the middle of the night and carried her _here_ – back to the man who almost killed her, but then again, according to the woman's files, she isn't exactly emotionally stable. Or maybe she just places very little value on her own life; Natasha remembers the way she had dispassionately reeled off the list of her injuries. It wasn't the fact that Alex was tough enough that they didn't hurt; it was the fact that she didn't _care_.

"Don't you have to be in court later today?" Fury asks, hearing her poorly concealed yawn.

"Don't remind me."

"It was you who wanted your past made public."

"But I didn't ask to be grilled by some idiot White House officials at 8 AM. Not all of us have the luxury of feigning death."

He roles his eyes, but Natasha knows that Fury isn't as indifferent as he pretends to be. Almost getting killed had changed him. In that single moment when those cars had boxed him in, he had realized what _hopelessly and hilariously outnumbered _was on a personal scale. What 'no way out' truly looked like. "How long do you give HYDRA to come after him?" he asks ignoring her, looking at the Winter Soldier.

"A while. They put all their energy and resources into infiltrating S.H.I.E.L.D. They'll be depleted, scrambling. People like that aren't much of a threat."

Fury's face tightens, stretching the scars round his blind eye tight. "That's the thing I'm worried about: who said they put all their energy and resources into the _Insight _program? Who says they don't have a Plan B? Hell, who says _Insight_ was even Plan A?"

"What are you saying?" Natasha asks, carefully.

"That when there's a tsunami, there's usually a second and third wave, Agent Romanov – and I want to be prepared for when they hit."

She looks at the two people in the room on the other side of the glass and understanding hits her. "You want to pair them up. Like me and Barton."

"Well seeing as your and Barton's faces are now a Google away from anyone on the planet, I want them to _replace _you and Barton."

A slight smirk pulls at the corner of her mouth. "This isn't the most sensitive way of firing me, Nick."

"You knew what you were doing when you released those files."

She nodded. She did. Her cover was blown – so was Clint's. There's was no way they could work undercover for S.H.I.E.L.D anymore. They were full-time members of the Avengers now.

"Fair enough," she says, crossing her arms. Then nods at the unknowing pair sitting only meters away from them. "Do you really think they're ready?"

"They better be. HYDRA's still got some rats left in S.H.I.E.L.D. I'm going to trickle some information down through the system - see if I can lure them out."

"Okay…Just be careful. You're fighting fire with fire: you don't want to push one of those two too far that they crack, Nick. Trust me."

* * *

**A/N **Mwahahaha. Now you know what Fury's really aiming for with this 'rehabilitation' program.

Thank you so much for all your reviews of support and encouragement. I'm glad that you're all so psyched for a Alex/Bucky relationship. I am too, trust me.

_Last Of The Lilac Wine_


	6. Chapter 6

**SHADOW**

* * *

**CHAPTER 6**

* * *

I call Mom to collect the moment I'm discharged from hospital and stand out on the street corner looking out for her tiny green Toyota Hybrid.

The city buzzes around me, reminding me that life has a way of continuing no matter what – in the distance I can hear jackhammers and cranes working over the sound of lunchtime traffic. The Pontomac river is a partially blocked view from where I stand, filtered by trees and buildings, but I can just about see a chunk of spaceship debris the size of a football pitch being hauled out the river. It reminds me of a news report I'd watched a few days ago where some S.H.I.E.L.D spokesperson had congratulated themselves on 'diverting a major crisis' and assuring the audience 'that the worst was over'. Then they'd dragged on the poor sorry bastard who was an economics analyst on screen who looked like they hadn't slept in years. 'This, coupled with New York last year,' he'd admitted, warily, 'is going to cost billions of taxpayers money to clean up. The effort could last a year – maybe two. We estimate that one of those airships that fell into the Pontomac is still completely intact. You can't just drag something that size out of the water.'

Then, the screen cuts to some screaming Captain America groupies and some old heroic propaganda footage of New York, and like _abra kadabra _nobody cares anymore.

I'm starving. The food the hospital gave me tasted and looked like rubber, so I pay for a hot dog from the street cart next to me. Extra onion and ketchup.

It is only when my mother pulls up that I realize the guy that serves me stared at me weirdly as he handed over my change. Her hands clap over her mouth as I climb into the car, sinking into the passenger seat with a wince. My ribs, again.

"Alex, what happened to your face?!" she demands as she lowers her hands slowly back onto the steering wheel. It's then that I remember I look like I've been hit by a truck. Twice.

"Mom, its okay – I'm fine," I say through a mouthful of hot dog. "Just drive."

She doesn't move. A car horn blares behind us: we are blocking the main downtown intersection. Suddenly, my mother reaches forwards and slaps me across the face as hard as she can in the confined space. My hand instantly goes to my stinging left cheek.

She's too busy muttering to herself under her breath in Bulgarian to coherently talk to me, but the fact that we cut across two whole lanes of traffic as she peels the car off the curb tells me she's about to explode.

"I don't know what I'm going to do about you Alexandria, I really don't," she snaps finally, her voice like a tightly coiled spring about to break. She roughly indicates left and then takes the corner at speed. Her whole body practically crackles with angry electricity and had you not known me before I'd been fired from S.H.I.E.L.D you would have been forgiven in thinking that I'd inherited my perpetual state of pissyness from my mother. The trust is, my anger is a product of my environment – circumstances – not genetics. Mom, on the other hand, has always been a tiny spark from a lit fuse. "I go through six years – SIX YEARS – of my only child coming home with injuries she won't explain. Knife wounds. Gun wounds. I though we were past all this when you told me about S.H.I.E.L.D, Alex, I really did. I'm disappointed in you."

This is standard Tanja tactics. Reminding me that I'm her only child – as if this gives me some kind of moral obligation to her that would have been absolved had I had another sibling – and then dropping those four words on me like they're some kind of bomb. _I'm disappointed in you_. Truthfully, it always sounded a lot more scary coming from Dad, because he didn't over use the phrase so many times that it loses it's meaning. It's probably just a force of habit for her to say that when we get into an argument, now.

"Great. Just keep your eyes on the road. I don't want to wind back up in hospital because you crash the car."

"And I didn't even know you were in hospital!" she rants. "I thought I was picking you up from Doctor Quick's!"

"You know my therapy appointments are on Sundays."

That causes her to explode. "Do I, Alex?! Do I?!" I want to say yes to goad her further, but I really don't want her to slap me again. "Does my whole life revolve around you? No! It doesn't! You're twenty nine now, not nine-years old! This is _precisely _why your father and I got a divorce –"

I tune her out. It was inevitable that Dad would be dragged into this at some point. She plays the bitter ex-wife so well; you wouldn't guess that the split eight years ago had been mutual.

By the time we reach the street my mother's house is on, her anger has diverted from me to my father – as I calculated it would – as she tells me about his latest girlfriend.

"Mom," I say, as we pull onto the gravel drive. I climb out of the car, slamming the door behind me. "I doubt she's actually seventeen."

"You don't know your father as well as I do, Alex," she says darkly.

Maybe, but I also know that my father is the Governor of the District of Columbia and it is more than his job is worth to be caught fraternizing with a seventeen year old.

We go into the house and I sit at one on the mismatched kitchen chairs as Mom moves round the place like a hurricane – slamming pots and pans down as she goes through the motions of making lunch. I pick up a leaflet left lying on the table.

"That's for you, by the way," she says, turning round and brandishing the knife she's using to chop up carrots dangerously close to my face.

"_No chaise lounge; no receptionist – no therapist's office_." I read,_ "Group sessions for a growing number of soldiers who…_Mom," I say, looking up. "I'm not an Iraq veteran."

"But you were in the middle of a war," she says turning back around to face the stove. "I've heard good things about these sessions. I think you should go."

"Even if I went, I wouldn't be able to talk about my…my _feelings_. Everything's classified. That's why I have a S.H.I.E.L.D appointed psychiatrist."

Her movements, that have seemed ceaseless since we've entered the house, suddenly still. She looks out the window for a second. "I know, Alex -" she says, not looking at me. Her shoulders are hunched forwards in a dejected, curved slump as she braces her hands either side of the worktop. "- but it's been a year and you're still not any better. I…I can't keep on looking at you like this. You're my baby girl. It hurts too much."

I know she's not talking about my freshly acquired wounds. I look down at the table, following the grain in the wood with my fingernail. "That's not true," I object, "I'm a lot better than I was at first."

"Oh true…true," she says, turning round again. She takes a deep breath and her expression suddenly clears back up as she makes the conscious decision to drop the subject and moves back to berating me again. "When was the last time you slept? You look awful."

"Must be something to do with the fact that my face looks like a bruised peach."

"_Alex_."

"I got a few hours sleep last night."

"Well, you can sleep on my bed for the afternoon. I'm not going to work today, so I can stay with you."

My head jerks up. When I came back from Bulgaria my mother moved into my apartment for the first month when I was really bad. Every night she would sit in a chair by my bed and hold onto my hand as I slept. It was like clinging to a lifebelt when you were drowning – something to anchor me back to the real world when I was submerged back in the horrors I'd seen in Bulgaria. A rope to pull me back out of the nightmares.

I feel my heart physically soften a few degrees. "Thank you," I say, softly.

Something hard hits me on the back of the head and I swear, my hand flying to the impact zone as I cast round for the object that hit me. Sleeping tablets.

"Take some of those," Mom barks. "I want you properly knocked out – I'm not going to have you clawing my hand in your sleep again. And don't think I didn't hear you use that word Alexandria! I'm only doing this for you if you promise to go to that meeting tomorrow."

* * *

**A/N **So we've met Alex's mother! What do you all think of Tanja?

You'll meet her father soon, and Steve and (as the leaflet hinted, Sam) soon as well – don't worry. Also there are plenty more Bucky/Alex interactions to come so don't fret.

_Last Of The Lilac Wine_


	7. Chapter 7

**SHADOW **

* * *

**CHAPTER 7**

* * *

_Please. Oh God, please help me._

_We're going to be okay._

…_I'm going to die._

_You're not going to die, I promise. Just hold on a little longer._

Sun glare blinds me the moment I open my eyes and I shield my face with my hand groggily.

"Mom?" I ask – because I went to bed at two in the afternoon and the bright light of a new day confuses me. She swims into focus as my eyes adjust; sat across from me reading a book, but when I speak she shuts it and gets up, pulling the cord on the Venetian blinds to let more sunlight in. "It's nine o clock in the morning. You slept nineteen hours straight."

I try to role onto my back but the blankets are knotted round my feet. I kick them free. "How did I sleep? Was I okay?"

"Alex, you gorged my hand," she says matter-of-factly, showing me the drawn out nail marks on her left wrist.

My stomach knots. "Mom…that's stupid that you let me do that to you. You should have just let go."

She stops bustling round the room for a second and reaches out to pat my ankle affectionately. When she smiles the crows feet at the corners of her eyes become more pronounced. "Never."

* * *

In the bathroom after my shower I stare at myself in the slightly steamed mirror as I towel dry my hair. The right side of my face is discolored from eye-socket to jaw; I still can't use my sprained wrist and bending over causes pain to lance through my ribs. Still, I've had worse.

I twist round and glance over my shoulder at the space between my shoulder blades and look at the scar that marks the spot where I was literally stabbed in the back. There's a longer line of ugly, puckered red skin on my left forearm but that was a slash, not a stab; deep enough to cut to the bone.

I dress quickly in the spare clothes I keep at Mom's and walk carefully down the narrow staircase to the kitchen. My mother's house is tiny, full of odd nooks and crannies. Even at fifty-nine she still holds down a full time job to cover the rent on it; too proud to accept financial help from me or my father. The redundancy money S.H.I.E.L.D gave me was more that I know what to do with and Dad practically owns a mansion in Washington and a chalet for the winter ski season in Switzerland; money has never been an issue for him.

I trail my good hand along the glass faces of the picture frames that line the staircase wall. A mixture of black-and-white and modern, colored photos chronicling the members of my mother's side of the family from my great grandparents standing outside their farmstead in the Bulgarian hills to a picture of me on my first day of Kindergarten. In the kitchen my mother is already dressed for work at her job down at the local Italian restaurant. Her grandparents brought her over to America when she was sixteen to escape the violence of the elections and she worked to support them the moment they arrived. She never completed full time education.

There's the sound of the news going in the background; mixed with the noises of my mother clattering around in the sink with the washing-up and the wind chime hanging by the open window. My attention is grabbed by the highlights of the hearing of Agent Natasha Romanov and I pick up the TV remote from the kitchen table and jack up the volume a little more.

"_To the White House's allegations that Miss Romanov should be put in jail for the crimes she has committed,_" says the news anchor, "_Natasha Romanov – more widely known by her alias 'The Black Widow' – had this to say:_"

"_You won't throw me in jail…" _the edited footage displays Natasha saying, coolly, "_…because you're going to need me_."

Her words remind me of her warning that HYDRA could still be out there and my face tightens as I remember the airships falling from the sky just last week. A mile to the left or right, and they could have crushed downtown and killed thousands of people; one of those people could have been Mom.

"Could that be you?" My mother asks, attacking some stubborn pasta sauce that has crusted in a pan viciously.

"What do you mean?" I ask, decreasing the volume again as the news moves on to the next topic.

"Should I be worried that the next hearing they show on TV about ex-S.H.I.E.L.D operatives is going to be one concerning my daughter?"

I'm slightly offended. "Mom, you know I haven't done anything half as sketchy as some of the stuff she's done."

"Honey, it wouldn't matter if the worst thing you'd done was stab someone in the hand with a letter opener; you're the District Govenor's daughter. That's big news."

"All the more reason it'll be kept out of the media – you know how Dad felt about me working for S.H.I.E.L.D."

She only sniffs; her way of conceding that I have a point. "You're going to cover up that black eye with some makeup before you go to the meeting, aren't you?" she asks instead, finishing with the washing up and turning to face me. "You look like a victim of domestic abuse."

I wave my sunglasses in front of her face and move forwards to kiss her on the cheek goodbye. "I've got these. I'll see you tomorrow."

The weekly debriefing sessions are held in a town hall down by the riverside. It's a nice day – sunny – which at least gives me pretext for the glasses. I'm directed by a smiling receptionist to the end of the hall and the big, open room on the left; I am one of the last people to arrive – almost every chair is full, but I didn't have any inclination to sit, anyway. Once I've signed the register I move to stand in one of the more shadowy corners of room with my arms folded. People twist round in their seats and glance at me every now and then. I can tell they think I'm a prize bitch because that's what everyone assumes when you're too cool to take your sunglasses off indoors. I ignore them.

Soldiers are different to special operatives. They have a happy trigger finger and, by job definition, have an inability to make a decision that is not authorized by a higher-up. Special agents often work in isolation from command for months at a time – it takes skill; independence. My post traumatic stress disorder is not the same as theirs. They have the ability to blame it on extraneous circumstances, the ability to say – god forbid – 'I was just following orders'. With independence comes responsibility. This session does not apply to me. Or, at least, this is what I tell myself as our speaker comes in and stands at the podium at the front of the room. It is easier to view myself as a bystander than a participant.

I look at the man running the session as he talks, trying to place my finger on why he is so familiar. He introduces himself as Samuel Wilson. He is dressed casually, and has the obvious look of ex-army, but there is nothing to identify him as being somebody I should know. His talk lasts twenty minutes, with the remaining forty minutes of the session allocated to group discussion and exercises, which – obviously – I do not partake in.

When everyone leaves the man called Sam Wilson busies himself with shuffling some papers on the podium. "You know," he says, not looking up at me, "don't you think it's a little bit dark to be wearing shades indoors?" I step out of the shadows, into the center of the room and pull the sunglasses off, raising an eyebrow. He glances up and lets out a lower whistle. "That is…one _hell _of a black eye. Where'd you get it?"

I shrug. "It doesn't hurt."

He laughs and shakes his head, stepping round the podium and walking up to me. "Nu-uh," he says. "You don't get to walk in here, all _mysteriously _with your _mysterious _black leather jacket and sunglasses and just stand in the corner of the room through my therapy session…_mysteriously;_ then give transparent-ass evasive answers, Agent. What are you _really_ doing here?"

I blink. "What makes you think I'm a special agent?"

"When S.H.I.E.L.D operatives stop dressing in all black the rest of us'll believe you guys when you say you're actually tryingto blend in."

"Well," I say, bluntly, "it's ex-S.H.I.E.L.D agent now. So you're only half right."

His gaze softens: he realizes I was here for the exact same reason everyone else was. I have PTSD. "You know it would help you a hell of a lot more if you actually joined in, right?"

My mouth twists into a sarcastic smile. "Baby steps," I say - then I realize where I've seen him before. "You're the Falcon, aren't you?"

"The what?"

"The Falcon," I repeat dryly. "It's what the media are calling you. You know…'cause of the wings."

"The Falcon," he says slowly, testing it. He grins. "Shit, I actually like that - sounds god damn _majestic_ – don't it Cap?"

I turn, surprised, to see Captain America standing in the doorway.

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**A/N **I'm so glad all of you enjoyed meeting Alex's Mom. As you can see, she plays a big role in Alex's life and has a massive impact on her as a character. I'm going to introduce her father to the story soon, too, so that should be coming up in later chapters. But obviously, next chapter you can expect the all-important Steve interactions and probably some more Bucky, too!

Beginning of this chapter had some more links back to the 'Bulgaria incident' – I'll continually be dropping a few more of those in throughout the story until we reach the chapter dealing with the event itself.

Thank you for all your lovely reviews thus far!

_Last Of The Lilac Wine_


	8. Chapter 8

**AUTHOR'S NOTE **

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Story **DISCONTINUED**

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I am aware that this is a decision that will upset 343 people, and for this I sincerely apologise. For a more detailed explanation, please see my profile page.

- _Last Of The Lilac Wine_


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